The ZRT Laboratory Blog

Growing your own fruits and vegetables is both challenging and rewarding. Many people plant gardens with the expectation that they can control what goes into their food. Gardening, especially in urban areas, has grown in popularity, but unfortunately, it comes with some risks. Contamination with elements present in the air, soil, or groundwater is a concern in both urban and rural gardens, and…

Tags: Heavy Metals, Essential Elements, Elements Testing, Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic, Thallium, Mercury, Zinc, Copper

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When shopping for jewelry, do you consider what metals make up earrings, bracelets, rings, and other shiny items? A report by the Center for Environmental Health (CEH) in California detailed that cadmium was present in numerous jewelry items tested from stores including Ross, Walgreens and Nordstrom Rack. The amount of cadmium, a toxic heavy metal, ranged from 40-100% in the items testing…

Tags: Cadmium, Elements Testing, Heavy Metals

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Cadmium is a dangerous heavy metal and a known carcinogen. Even though daily exposure is usually relatively low compared to toxins like arsenic, cadmium bioaccumulates with a half-life in the body of 25-30 years. Essentially, the older you are, the more cadmium you have stored in your body. When cadmium exposure is high, it increases cellular oxidation products that deplete antioxidants like…

Tags: Dried Urine Testing, Heavy Metals, Cadmium, Fertility

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Influenced by our environment, we are constantly being exposed to elements, whether nutritional or toxic. They are a big contribution to the yin yang dualism of health and disease. With heavy metals, contamination is so extensive nowadays that it is no longer a question of whether exposure took place, but rather what the level of exposure was or continues to be. Toxicity from low levels of exposure…

Tags: Neurotransmitters, Mental Health, Heavy Metals, Elements Testing, Toxins, Arsenic, Mercury, Cadmium

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A couple years back, I wrote a blog about iodine deficiency in athletes resulting from excessive sweat loss. Later, while studying the kinetics of the iodine loading test which involves taking a 50-mg dose of iodine and collecting urine for 24 hours, I investigated the excretion of iodine in sweat along with urine. Surprisingly iodine levels in sweat tracked urine iodine excretion over a period of…

Tags: Dried Urine Testing, Heavy Metals, Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic, Mercury

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Is there anything more endearing than the photographs of your baby eating his or her first foods? Their faces squish-up, they are covered from head to toe, their tongues protrude to catch every bite or more often to try to get the revolting taste out of their mouths. Now, we parents are the ones squishing up our faces and showing huge grimaces of disgust at the latest report that our baby food is…

Tags: Toxins, Heavy Metals, Lead, Arsenic, Cadmium

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A recent news story reports that the Clean Label Project, a non-profit organization focused on health and transparency in consumer product labeling, tested 530 baby food products for toxic elements and chemicals. The results were not good. Sixty-five percent of products tested "positive" for arsenic, 36% for lead, 58% for cadmium, and the tests even showed high levels of BPA in “BPA Free”…

Tags: Toxins, Dried Urine Testing, Heavy Metals, Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic, Mercury

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A recent study from researchers at the Mayo Clinic in conjunction with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) revealed that people following a gluten-free diet have significantly higher arsenic, cadmium, lead, and mercury levels in urine and blood than those not following a gluten-free diet. Another similar study in 2006 revealed that vegans and vegetarians have an increased…

Tags: Toxins, Dried Urine Testing, Heavy Metals, Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic, Mercury

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As a hormone testing lab, ZRT understands the importance of a well-balanced endocrine system in maintaining overall health. Hormone balance is achieved through multiple feedback mechanisms, and when any part of the system is thrown out of whack by forces beyond its control, there is a knock-on effect on the rest of the body systems that are under endocrine control. Such forces can include extreme or…

Tags: Hormone Balance, Xenoestrogens, Heavy Metals, Toxins, BPA, Lead, Mercury, Cadmium

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Studies have found toxic heavy metals, including lead, cadmium, arsenic, aluminum, mercury and other toxins deemed hazardous by the CDC in a random sampling of lip products used by women of all ages. For millions of women the world over, this casts a pall on the transformative promise of cosmetics to make us look and feel more beautiful.…

Tags: Patient Education, Heavy Metals, Toxins, Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic, Mercury

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